Letter from the Producer LIVE Part XVIII Q&A Updates

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Q1: I’d like to know how you go about looking into things when balancing jobs. Can you also tell us what prompted you to adjust dragoon?

A1: When it comes to job balance, we make adjustments looking at DPS that is output on the training dummies and DPS that is actually output while in content.

There are two reasons for why we decided to make adjustments to dragoon.

The first is the amount of damage taken by magic-related attacks. While other jobs are able to take the same magical hit twice and survive, there are a lot of cases where dragoons taking the same two hits will die. The second reason is the fact that it’s easier for dragoons to wind up dead and there has been more and more feedback mentioning that participating in end-game content is becoming increasingly difficult.

Q2: Could you provide details on upcoming dragoon changes and tell us when the changes will go live?

A2: We will be making changes to the directional requirement on some actions. Specifically, you will not lose the buff if you fail to meet the directional requirement on the action. We understand there are currently situations where a dragoon is unable to go to a certain side of a enemy. After these changes go live, the overall damage drop in these situations should be less.

Additionally, we will be increasing the magic defense that they are currently lacking.

We will be making other adjustments to the dragoon’s action including the reduction of recast timers on certain skills, decreasing the increased damage taken during blood for blood, and increasing the DoT damage on certain actions.

We will be making these adjustments in patch 2.45 which is scheduled for December 9th.

Q3: Ninja is able to silence, stun, and I feel like their DPS output is a bit too high. Do you have any plans to make adjustments to they are balanced with other jobs?

A3: With the mudra combinations, ninja is a job where it’s tricky to deal damage, and we’ve set their DPS to be somewhat higher than other jobs. However, players have really been pushing ninja to the limit, and while it’s only by a slight percentage, DPS is being output a bit higher than anticipated. Due to this, in order to make their DPS output similar to other jobs, we will be making adjustments to DPS and the TP costs of certain actions, while ensuring that the current rotation is not destroyed.

Q5: There is a lot of equipment for summoner and bard where stats such as spell speed and skill speed do not really match the concept of the job. These aren’t very advantageous, so will you be making adjustments to this in the future?

A5: We’ve made it so that for FINAL FANTASY XIV the ultimate goal is to obtain raid level equipment. However, we’ve added various stats to equipment due to the fact that there would no longer be a need for equipment that can be purchased with Allagan tomestones of poetics or equipment made by Disciples of the Hand.

We’ve been carefully looking over the feedback we’re receiving and we will be looking into what we will do moving forward.

Q6: You previously mentioned each job will have their own limit break. Could you provide more information on this?

A6: We are currently talking about implementing job-specific limit breaks in the upcoming expansion.

It may be difficult to prepare three different limit breaks per job so we have decided to adjust the level 3 limit break used by each job. As an additional note, we are currently working on creating a new limit break for dragoon!

Additionally, we are planning to launch new benchmark software for the expansion and you will be able to see the new limit break then.

Furthermore, the limit break of bards will no longer be the same as the limit breaks for healers.

Q8: Currently, there are a lot of content for the hardcore users and the casual users, but not many for the mid-tier users. Are there any plans to implement additional content for the mid-tier users that are able to beat Crystal Tower, but not the Coil of Bahamut?

A8: In the upcoming expansion, we will be introducing a new content for the mid-tier users which is currently referred to as “free company craft” (final name TBD). Additionally, we are planning to implement normal modes and hard modes for the raid dungeons. Please look forward to it!

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